Her Own Little World
by Conraat
Summary: When the rest of the world tells you you're crazy, how can it be otherwise? NZ x America, sort of.
1. Chapter 1

"Welcome back to group therapy, everybody! We've got a newcomer in our midst, so why don't you all say hello?"

The man doesn't introduce her and nobody says hello so she can feel herself turning back into a piece of furniture.

"Oh, come on, people, that's not very friendly." The man, who she's nicknamed Happy Spaniard, sighs. But doesn't press the matter further.

"Who wants to speak first? Why don't you kick us off, Alfred?" chirps Happy Spaniard. She's decided that he's the only one who ever speaks in this place because she can't remember anyone else saying one word to her.

Then a bouncy, blonde guy with glasses that look broken speaks up.

"I'm Alfred, seventeen years old. I'm an American so therefore I'm a hero!"

**"That's stupid."**

She doesn't realise she's spoken until she sees everyone staring at her. Captain Heroic – the American – looks like he's gonna beat her up.

"A-ah… Aroha, why do you think that?"

It's Happy Spaniard speaking again. She decides he just likes to listen the sound of his own voice.

**"Nobody's a hero. Not in this world. He's just crazy."**

The words coming out of her mouth aren't hers but they have to be, because sane people don't speak words that aren't their own, and she's not insane, so they have to be hers.

She thinks Happy Spaniard is going to turn into Unhappy Spaniard by the way he's frowning as he talks. Is he talking to her? She can't tell because she _can't hear him_, really, over the whoosh of the tide in her ears.

Then someone puts their hand on her shoulder and she _screams_, pulled back into a memory that isn't hers but fills her with terror all the same—

A young Maori boy stalking his prey, not seeing the man with the musket until it's too late and the muzzle of that fucking _death stick_ is pressed to the small of his back and the trigger clicks and all there is is _pain_—

Her thoughts are interrupted by a purr of Spanish and her jaw snaps shut, her scream cut off in an instant. She doesn't think Happy Spaniard knows he's speaking Spanish; his eyes are still working in English and still trying to talk to her in English.

His arms are around her all of a sudden and she leans into him, ragged breaths making her whole body shake.

**"Don't touch me."**

The words must not get through her tears because Happy Spaniard doesn't move. He's switched back to English by now – must have realised his mistake – but the words don't have the calming effect they did in Spanish. So she pushes him away and stands up, and nobody makes any move to stop her as she crosses the little circle and goes over to sit by a boy she's calling Iceman.

Iceman's sitting in the corner, staring out the window, and doesn't even look at her when she sinks down to the floor next to him. His scarf reaches down to tickle her nose (and make her sneeze) and wave hello and blink its pretty pink eyes.

She would say hello back but she gets the feeling Iceman would snap at her like an angsty kea.

A buzz rises up in the background as the group therapy session gets itself back into some semblance of order. She closes her eyes and zones out and when she comes back the buzz is gone and Captain Heroic is sitting in front of her, staring, and Iceman's moved to the other side of the room.

"You're from America," she says by way of a conversation.

Captain Heroic blinks blue eyes that hold all the sky and nods. "Yeah."

"I'm from New Zealand."

"Where's that?" Captain Heroic asks, and she doesn't answer. He changes tactics.

"So you're Aroha?"

She shrugs and tangles her fingers in her hair. "So they say. I don't remember."

Captain Heroic doesn't know what to say to that, so he tries again. "How'd you get that cut?" He reaches out to touch the long gash that stretches across her forehead but she slaps his hand away, hard enough to make him grunt in pain.

It takes her a while to come up with a lie that's even slightly believable; they sit there in silence while her mind whirs so slowly away.

"I fell over and hit my head on the table" is the best she can come up with.

Captain Heroic stands up abruptly and sighs and walks away, and she decides he doesn't like the smell of bullshit.

By the end of the day she has nicknames for all of the patients and one staff member. There's Happy Spaniard and Captain Heroic and Iceman; then there's also Control Freak who's blonde and blue-eyed and Aryan like Captain Heroic, and who thinks the world will end if everybody doesn't keep order; Tinkerbelle, a grown man with eyebrows like furry caterpillars who talks to 'fairies'; and Colonel Cranky, who's Italian and has anger issues.

And none of them like her.

* * *

**Author's Note: **This fic is an excuse for me to get my insanity out onto paper.

A few notes - Aroha, New Zealand, has a voice in her head. That's the stuff in bold. Sometimes it tries to speak for her and when it does that there will be quotation marks around the boldness.

A kea is a bird. A taniwha is... is... look it up, okay. It's cool.


	2. Chapter 2

The walls of her room are blinding, bright white. Someone had given her crayons—

**You're twelve, twelve year olds don't use crayons.**

-but she left them sitting, unhappy and unused, on the table next to her bed. They're the only splash of colour in the room and she likes that. There are darker flecks in some of the crayons and she tries joining them up like a conncect-the-dots puzzle—

Next thing she knows she's standing on her bed, blue crayon in her hand, the tip pressed to the blinding white wall. She knows she'll get yelled at if she _defaces_ anything in the room (she learned that word from her school principal when she painted a taniwha on the side of Room 14) but there are some things you can't not do. And she scrawls, in big blue letters, _Aroha Wellington_, which is her name. She saw Happy Spaniard write it down on his red clipboard.

And then her room is pretty.

She's starting on a little black and brown and white fantail when the door opens and Happy Spaniard is standing there.

And he sighs and says "Aroha" in the way that makes you squirm and feel guilty.

And he smiles a fake little smile and talks to her like she's a stupid child.

**Which you are.**

"Why don't you finish that little birdie in Art? Come on, or we'll be late."

The clock beside her bed told her she woke up at six o'clock, which was too early. And classes start at ten (she doesn't know what else to call them other than 'classes'). But she hasn't been drawing for long… has she?

She glances back at the walls and sees why Happy Spaniard sais her name in that disappointed way. The crayons must have been ground down to nothing because the walls are _covered_; there's hardly any of that blinding white left.

She doesn't know _why_ she feels bad but she _does_; maybe because she's turned Happy Spaniard into Unhappy Spaniard.

And that is the worst thing that could happen.

* * *

She's decided that she likes the peppy Italian who takes Art. He knows how to deal with Colonel Cranky (are they brothers?) and he draws like her Daddy used to; with long, flowing lines and bright colours, and pretty landscapes that remind her of home. Even though he's so much better than her, it doesn't make her feel like her work is bad.

And best of all, he doesn't treat her like she's a little kid.

Even so, it takes her a while to start drawing. She had wanted to draw the 'little birdie' but the image has faded from her mind. So after a time she starts painting (she's better at painting) one of her dreamscapes.

Painting a dreamscape makes her sad but it's better than painting something happy and fake. Happy Spaniard and Mister Pep would disagree but their opinions don't matter, do they?

**They do. You know they do.**

The dreamscape she paints is dark. It's hard to see anything but if you look properly or wait for a lightning flash (it's happened to her before) you can just see the muskets poking out from behind trees and blood smearing the trunks; if you look even closer you can see the bodies sinking into the churned-up mess of mud and leaves; and if you've got a good eye you _might_ be able to spot the man with his mere raised, about to split someone's skull.

Apparently Happy Spaniard has a good eye because as he walks past he sighs and says "Aroha" like before, and makes a note next to _Aroha Wellington_ on his red clipboard.

She feels an unasked question lingering so after a while she says "It's a dreamscape", but Happy Spaniard is already on the other side of the room.

* * *

She asked Mister Pep, the peppy Italian, if she could take the picture back to her room. He smiled and nodded and told her not to tell Antonio, who she guessed was Happy Spaniard. She now it's hanging on her wardrobe from a pin she probably shouldn't have.

She doesn't dare look at it because it makes her sad, but it's still good to know it's there, next to her bright crayon art.

And then Captain Heroic comes in.

He looks at the picture and doesn't say anything. He looks at the crayon art and doesn't say anything. He sits down on the end of her bed and doesn't say anything.

He opens his mouth to say something, and then he leaves.

* * *

**Author's Note: **Blah blah blah the chapters are short yes I know. There are Maori words just shoved in at random here. Mere is a weaponnnn from way back. It's awesome.

REVIEW OH MY GOD I will love you forever if you do. C:


	3. Chapter 3

"Captain Heroic!"

The words shriek out of her mouth before she can stop them and she _doesn't care_, because he's _seen_ her. And she runs at him, arms outstretched like she wants a hug. He stretches his arms out too, raises an eyebrow and tilts his head in confusion. And then she puts her years of playing rugby to good use and tackles him to the ground—

**You idiot.**

-and smiles and says "Kia ora".

He looks like he wants to say it back but he doesn't get the chance because suddenly there are hands all over her, dragging her up and back away from him and she's screaming again (don't they know not to touch her?).

She must zone out because when she comes back she's sitting in a corner of her room, shivering like it's below zero.

And the walls are blinding white again.

The door swings open and clicks shut. And Happy Spaniard is standing there. Some angry monster inside her heart rears its ugly head and she flies at him—

**Kiwis can't fly,** and she can swear the voice is smirking—

-and she beats his chest with her little fists.

**"How could you! How could you!"**

He's saying things to calm her down, but she can't make sense of the words. The stress of the situation must get to him after a while because he slips back into Spanish; almost immediately she _stops_ and _wails_ and sobs something in Maori. Then his arms are around her and holding her while she whispers things in English and in Maori.

It's either the Bible or the Treaty of Waitangi; neither of them are sure.

Happy Spaniard's eyes have finally learnt to work in Spanish, and he doesn't switch back to English. She prefers that, because she doesn't have to listen and try understand the words.

And then he leaves, and for once she feels lonely.

And loneliness _hurts_.

* * *

She's missed breakfast every day so far. Either she sleeps in too late, or she wakes up too early and gets lost in thought. Or she hides when people come to collect her. She doesn't mind, though, because she doesn't ever feel hungry and is actually quite _repulsed_ by the idea of food (that word she learnt when she eavesdropped on a teacher telling off a cluster of bullies).

One thing she never misses is group therapy. Happy Spaniard doesn't let her. Besides, she wouldn't pass up a chance to watch and see how crazy people act—_real _crazy people, that is, not whatever nonsense they call her.

She doesn't think they've diagnosed her yet. Not that there's anything to diagnose. She doesn't belong here, after all.

She's been here for a couple of weeks. And at the end of each day, she's seen Happy Spaniard write on his red clipboard—_No progress_, in loopy handwriting—she doesn't understand how there could be progress in the first place is there was nothing to fix. All that's wrong with her—

**There are a lot of things wrong with you.**

-is that she had forgotten most of her life. The voice in her head that whispers and whines at her every so often—that doesn't count, it's normal, doesn't everybody have one? (She read that once, in a very respectable book by someone called—the name has disappeared along with her family.) So what if this _voice_ speaks for her sometimes? It doesn't matter. She can ignore it. So can everyone else, right? Just because she hears voices doesn't make her crazy—

**You're crazy.**

There's a knock on the door (people knock now?) and it slowly swings open. It's Happy Spaniard, of course, looking more like an Unhappy Spaniard to her.

"You missed group therapy," he says, and there's some emotion in his voice she _can't place_—though is that feeling so unfamiliar?

A frown twists those pretty Spanish features and her own face decides to mimic it. Group therapy? What time is it?

The clock next to her bed tells her it's nearly two in the afternoon.

"Ludwig got very distressed," he goes on. She knows she's supposed to act _disappointed_ and _contrite_—she should feel some _guilt_, but for some reason she finds his words unbearably funny; a little warning giggle turns into full-scale laughter and—at least Happy Spaniard's eyes are smiling now, even if his mouth doesn't want to.

"What about Captain Heroic? Did he say anything about it?" She's surprised; it's the first time she's spoken in days.

"Do you mean Alfred?" He pauses while she shrugs and nods. "Si. I think it was… 'Has anyone seen that crazy bitch?'"

She doesn't care that he called her that. She's heard worse—her mind goes back to a _new_ memory from her _old_ life with her Daddy screaming abuse—she's just happy that Captain Heroic noticed her. She shouldn't be, she knows she shouldn't be, he's five years older than her.

But she is.

* * *

Happy Spaniard's scheduled her a private Art session. He's interested in that she paints—that's what he tells her, the _lie_ he gives her (she's inclined to think so, when is anyone ever honest to a _worm_ like her?) as they walk there. She says she'll only paint for him if he paints something too. He agrees; much more readily than she had expected. And of course, she can't help but feel a little bit suspicious.

He asks her to paint whatever she wants but she can see in his eyes he wants a dreamscape. She would paint him what he wants but she remembers how he reacted to her dreamscape last time; she doesn't want to be sighed at like that again. So instead, she paints her walls.

She paints them like they were before Happy Spaniard got someone to paint over them; all bright colours and taniwhas in a million different moods and her name, big and bold and blue, right in the middle.

There's a window that shows the outside world (is it still the same? She hasn't been out for weeks—since she got here, even) and when she looks out she can't see a thing; it's all dark and gloomy and she's been painting for hours without realizing it. It's not done, though, not to the standard she'd like it, but Happy Spaniard is stretching and yawning and coming round to look at what she's done.

"Are we gonna be let outside, sir?" It's the first time she's said sir since she's arrived—since she was locked up here. It seems pointless but she grew up like that; it would be a bad idea to forget how to show respect here, of all places.

He doesn't say anything for a while, and when he does, there's not a word about the painting. "Maybe. I can ask Doctor Honda if you'd like. Would you like that?"

She nods and picks up her paintbrush again, dips it in red, and starts painting over her picture. But Happy Spaniard stops her hand, pulls her arm back quickly so her paintbrush jerks and paints a jagged red line on her nice green shirt. She opens her mouth like she's going to scream because _he's touching her_, but he whispers something in her ear in Spanish and no sound comes out. She feels like she's choking, the shriek sticking in her throat, but he keeps speaking to her and after a time she can close her mouth and she remembers how to breathe again—

Her breaths are big and gasping and he doesn't let go, and she doesn't realize at first that she's thrashing in his grip. But his hand is wrapped around her wrist with the strength of iron.

"What were you doing?" he asks quietly, gently, the English words sounding too unfamiliar and buzzing in her ear.

Her voice is empty and echoes in her head when she responds. "It was bad. I was getting rid of it."

He lets go but takes the paintbrush away so she can't reach it; she doesn't realize and makes motions like she's painting again.

"Aroha," he sighs (her stomach sinks), "it's beautiful. And the red paint makes it more… edgy."

She can't understand what he's saying but it seems to be praise, which she doesn't understand. She hates the damn thing; it's grown uglier and uglier with each passing moment. In her head it's just a _childish_ scattering of colourful blobs that she knows she should be embarrassed to have painted.

But he picks up the godforsaken thing and tells her he'll go back to her room with her and help her hang it up. She wants to protest but he mind is scrambled at can't make sentences. She can't even figure out how to say _no.

* * *

_

That night, the spiders arrive. They crawl all over her face and arms and make her scratch and writhe and stain the sheets red. She screams and screams and nobody comes to fix her.

The eyes of the taniwhas glitter hatefully at her in the dark. She can hear them screeching at her with a tui's voice and they swoop down like they want to peck her eyes out.

When she can move again she gets up and takes the painting off the wall. The eyes shrink back into the canvas but she can't get them out of her mind so she _slams_ the painting on the bed frame and smiles at the splinters.

And the spiders scuttle back into their holes.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Man, this one was an uphill battle. It took forever to write the painting scene and it still doesn't look right to me; then I couldn't get on the computer to type it up for like a week and I had to finish it at school for god's sake.

BUT I HOPE IT MAKES YOU HAPPY. C: now review me or I will hunt you down and murder you.

And one last thing; thank you to all my reviewers so far especially Nienthil who's commented on both chapters so far and filled me with the joy and motivation I needed to get on with this.

I know this is sounding a lot like an Oscars speech but I needed to say it I'm sorry don't kill me. ; u;


	4. Chapter 4

**Well aren't you a little idiot?**

"Hey, shut up."

**You scream and scream all night and no-one comes to rescue you.**

"Hey, hey, shut up."

**Not your idol Antonio. Not your lover boy Alfred.**

She would fight back but she feels like a sad, empty shell. Unhappy. How many times has she used that word lately?

**Haven't you stopped to think that **_**nobody**_** even **_**cares**_** about you?**

She tries to count but the numbers blur into each other. Or maybe that's because of the tears. She doesn't know. She never knows.

**Now you're crying like a spineless worm. That's all you are, isn't it?**

She knocks on the door, once, twice, _thrice_, but it's locked and—

**Nobody's going to come.**

-true to her word the door stays shut. She's trapped, stuck in a little white _cell_ with a floor covered in splinters.

**They left you pills.**

Yes, she's right, there's a little cup full of them; it's even in her hand already. How useful.

**Read the writing.**

Oh, yes. The writing. Sketching across the side of the cup and it says—

_No more than one tablet every five hours._

There are five little round pills in the little white cup. How potent are they?

They spill out onto the floor and the cup follows, slipping from fingers that snap, snap, _snap_—

Potent enough to need a warning.

**You could end it now.**

Yes. She could. It's not like she hasn't considered it already. But what would be the point?

**Did you forget already, little nothing? **_**Nobody cares.**_

If that's true—she won't say it is, not just yet. She won't let herself.

It wouldn't be so hard.

The tablets drop, one by one by one onto a tongue that feels _swollen_ (did she bite it in the night?) and she lets herself smile.

_This is right_. This is _supposed to happen_.

And she _swallows_ and zones _out_ and everything goes _**black**_.

* * *

She tries to speak but she can't get any words past that swollen tongue; her eyes are open and _staring_, up and into and _through_ Happy Spaniard's. It almost hurts to look at him when he's painted with such bright colours—yellow and red and green—so _garish_, it's almost worse than the blinding white walls that are everywhere in this place—

She blinks and Happy Spaniard's gone—and she's hot, it's hot. She can almost see the heat rising off her skin. And it _itches_, burns and itches with spiders—marching, marching up and down limbs and _why doesn't somebody kill them_?

Another blink and time has gone too fast; the window in the blinding white room tells her it's night-time. And she's alone, there isn't the sound of safe shoes tapping on lino—alone with the heat that _sears_ her flesh—

She screams, because hasn't that always worked before? And almost instantly—thank God—there are safe shoes tap-tap-tapping on the lino and a little jab in her arm—she gets a moment, half a blink, before her eyes shut and the sounds of Happy Spaniard's prayers fade to black.

* * *

"You gave us quite a scare, Aroha."

She doesn't realise her eyes are open until she hears the barely-concealed panic in Happy Spaniard's voice; then everything shifts into focus. She wants to wave but her arm won't _move_, almost like she's stuck to whatever's keeping her off the floor—table, bed, she has no idea.

"With all those pills, a-and—" A quick stutter and his sentence cuts off like he's scared to show any _weakness_—she wouldn't comfort him only she can't think of what to say.

He gulps air and tries again. "With all those pills, and the scratches you gave yourself…"

His fingers trail up her arm as his voice trails off, and she can swear he's looking at her with—concern, yes, that's what's killing his pretty green eyes. It's concern, only she can't think why—after all, _nobody cares_.

"They had to give you some strong painkillers to stop you screaming; the pain must have been unbearable."

Pain? There was no _pain_, not at any stage—relief then burning then itching but never _pain_, unless you count the aching that's eating away at her heart—

But that doesn't _count_, after all, because wouldn't that just make her even _crazier_ than they already think she is? (And of course it's only thinking, she's not crazy, no way-)

Then there's the question she'll never be able to answer. Not in a million years.

"Why'd you do it, Aroha?"

That's when—for the first time—her eyes prick and spill down her cheeks and her vision blurs—Happy Spaniard in his garish colours disappears from view and she wants him _back_ so she _screams_, only this time nobody comes to save her. And the hand on her arms serves as an anchor and the best she can do is close her eyes and wish it all away.

* * *

The next time she wakes up she's back in her room and her walls—

**How clueless they all are.**

-her walls are back to how they used to be, like they were in her painting. And oh, God, she can hardly bear to look at them now—but she _must _because Happy Spaniard did this, he did this for her, and she doesn't want to be _disrespectful_—

Then she sees it; down in the corner by the head of her bed, in pretty elegant handwriting—

_I've added something nice for you~ Try find it! And get better soon! Ciao, bella~_

And of course she knows who it is and suddenly this _monstrosity_ is easier to bear. So she lays back down (when did she ever sit up?) and lets her eyes wander and search the walls.

But she can't find anything; lost in the swirl of crayon in all the colours of the rainbow.

* * *

**Author's Note:** My, my. You guys are lucky I write too much. You don't have to wait for weeks for each new chapter 3

I'm introducing a new character next chapterrr~ See if you can guess who!

Also, review. B| Not kidding, folks.


	5. Chapter 5

Her first visitor—_proper _visitor—comes on the Thursday after the _incident_; long enough after for everyone to forget what happened (crazy people have _terrible_ memories) despite the white bandages still cloaking her limbs, just like a mummy. Bandages she can't help but pick at; bandages that every so often go brilliant red, which is when everyone starts to worry again—and she _hates_ when they worry.

But nobody seems to notice that.

Wild hair, bright, tanned skin—a Band-Aid across the bridge of his nose and dirt sulking in the stitches of his clothes—her visitor is certainly _strange_ and not at all the type you'd expect to see in such an immaculate, sterilized place. She doesn't know him (though her heart ticks oddly when he enters) but he seems to know her all too well; makes a beeline straight for her with an unfamiliar orderly lurking by the door—throws himself down on her bed and musses up her tidy white sheets.

"You been in the wars again, mate?" he asks in a grating accent; the Australian twang stirs an awful feeling of rivalry somewhere around her liver.

**"Ugh, you turned back into an Aussie."**

He laughs; ruffles her hair in the way that she hates and sends her cringing away. "So you remember me, then. I was worrying, with you forgetting Mum and Dad and all that—"

"Remember you?" Her eyebrow lifts quizzically; her voice squeaks. "I dunno who you even are."

It's not the answer he expects; he stops for a moment before sighing out a breath and setting his hands down to rest in his lap—clinging to the olive fabric for dear life.

"Yeah, well, you should. I'm your favourite brother, alright? Disappeared for a while but that's all in the past—name's Riley Wellington—that bring anything back?"

It does. A chilly winter day—cold enough that even having all three heaters on wasn't enough to warm the house—and Riley standing at the door with his navy suitcase and his hair cut short like a soldier; their mother saying in a teary voice that boot camp wouldn't be as bad as he thought, that it was just until he sorted himself out.

"Not a thing," she lies.

"Okay, well…" Another sigh and he runs his fingers through his hair—the shaking doesn't go unnoticed. "Let's take a walk, then, and—I'll catch you up on your whole life,"

He picks her up like you would a child—one arm under her legs and the other looping around her back; clutching her to his chest. It seems that the unfamiliar orderly is more surprised than she is; her quiet yelp is masked by him leaping to his feet, little brown ponytail bobbing behind green eyes and a face that screams _easily intimidated_.

"Relax, mate," Riley says, flashing a brilliant white grin—she would nickname him but it feels _wrong._ "I'm just gonna get her to show me around the place—hell, you can even follow us if that'd give you peace of mind."

Unfamiliar Orderly ducks his head and blinks his eyes (astoundingly dull green eyes). "I-I'm supposed to, anyway, so… L-lead on," he stammers; she can't help but think he wouldn't make a very good doctor at all. "Please do try not to get into t-too much trouble." A thin smile—fake, sickeningly _fake_—and he opens the door ahead of them; ducks his head one more time in what reminds her of a bow (a bow from an Eastern European, it's madness—and then where are we, exactly?).

Riley flashes his brilliantly white grin one last time; hops out the door like the kangaroo stitched onto his sleeve. The memories he brings back rattle around in her head and drive her _mad._ She wants them to go—she wants _him_ to go, but—she can't deny he makes her feel _safe_; so like Happy Spaniard in so many ways.

"What time is it?" he calls to Unfamiliar Orderly—it's funny how she only sees the staff _now_—she's been here for—how long? Years—two years, in fact—and it's coming up on her fourteenth birthday.

"Ten o'clock," Unfamiliar Orderly calls back, and she _jerks_; eyes opening wide before shutting tight. Riley drops his head down close to her ear and whispers.

"What's wrong, Sheila?"

She shakes her head quickly—three times for luck. "Nothing. Group therapy. I mean—nothing."

Riley throws back his head and laughs, loud enough to make her jerk again. "S'that all? Come on, we'll go. It wouldn't do you any good to miss it—and you can introduce me to all your friends, yeah?" (Friends—what friends—but he doesn't-can't-won't ever know.)

They start walking again. She claws at his collar but he ignores her—she writhes in his grip but he only grips _tighter_. And she would scream, but—that never makes people let go, it only makes them come closer, _closer_—

She blinks and time has moved to _fast_; they're already seated between Captain Heroic and Iceman and everyone is _staring_, staring at the crazy girl perched on Riley's lap (he's much too old for her, of course, but that doesn't stop their _staring_).

Happy Spaniard comes in and sits down; Riley sits straighter as if it'll make a difference. (It won't, but he doesn't-can't-won't ever know.)

"Who wants to start us off?" That's all—he doesn't mention Riley, the oddity in their little group—

She's about to open her mouth when Riley cuts her off, his voice clear, bright almost. "I don't think Aroha'll every speak here—she doesn't remember anything so why would she—Can I speak for her?" A short pause, Happy Spaniard's affirming nod, everyone still _staring_—and he's talking again.

"Well, we've got a big family—loads of kids we know and loads of kids we don't. All adopted. And Aroha's the youngest, the baby—" He ruffles her hair and she cringes.

Control Freak is gone.

"Mum and Dad—they're not really right in the head, neither of them. Mum's depressed and Dad's an alcoholic, rageaholic—I'm sort of surprised more of us aren't crazy."

Happy Spaniard is the only one listening. Happy Spaniard and Captain Heroic and maybe Iceman, in an offhand sort of way.

Tinkerbell is gone too.

"I suppose Aroha was always a little bit mad. But one day Dad had been out drinking and truly went off his rocker; screaming and yelling all sorts of shit, and Aroha got in his way." Pressure on her forehead, on her gash—scar now, healed over—and she slaps his hand away; snarls. He's unfazed. "That's how she got that."

Colonel Cranky is gone as well—Mister Pep's smile was just that little bit more forced the day before. Like Happy Spaniard's is not, glancing at the empty chair that isn't empty.

"So then after that, for the next day or two, when she talked it'd all be awful things in this weird disembodied voice. And she forgot who we were. Mum didn't want to live with that so she sent Aroha here. And that's about it."

She had thought it would feel good to have her story told but it _doesn't_—she can see it hanging in the air, all awkward like a huge buzzing bluebottle, and she can feel everyone judging her.

"Oh. I had wondered how you'd got that scar, Aroha." It's Happy Spaniard talking again, with that smile still plastered on his face—that stupid forced smile. "Well, in any case, it's good to finally know your story."

The three are gone but the circle is still full; living-breathing bodies filling spaces that should have been empty—Happy Spaniard still glances at the not-empty seat and she can see the missing pieces in his eyes. Black hair-blonde hair-brown hair; one with a name tag that proclaims she's Miss Héderváry and the other two hidden under masks of indifference.

"And, everyone—This is Riley Wellington, and as of today he'll be joining us at this facility."

The introduction she never got, and jealousy surges—but she notices something else and her attention is dragged away.

Because for the first time she sees the gash on her brother's face—the same as the one that split her forehead on that first day.

* * *

**Author's Note: ** augh did you get the allusion to her memory loss in the first paragraph!

tell me you did or i have failed yoooou.

uhm meet australia guise. he loves you. and guess who the three newcomers are. :L on that note, review. please. i'm begging you.


End file.
